Furry Friday: Picnic for One

With the release of my newest tutorial drawing book Draw More Furries, I wanted to take a moment to highlight some of the talented artists who contributed illustrations. Given that so many artists these days work digital (myself included), it was a wonderful treat to have Kacey Miyagami do a traditional acrylic painting for the book. Check out the exquisite coloring on this lovely illustration of a shy raccoon enjoying apple pie. The delicate textures of fur and blades of grass are a nice touch.

Here’s what she had to say about her artistic process:

"I work primarily traditionally, my preferred medium for illustration being fluid acrylic paints. Fluid acrylics are a watered down version of full body acrylics, which behave similarly to both acrylics and watercolors. I start an illustration with one or more simple concept sketches, which I then redraw and refine into a finished pencil sketch on cold-press illustration board. Often, I will scan this pencil sketch and do a quick digital color test to determine shadow placement and overall color scheme before committing to the actual painting. Once I begin painting, I will work from the background forward, painting the characters last, to make sure they feel unified with their surroundings. A particular focus of mine with character illustrations is to create detailed environments to provide greater context and narrative for the characters." - Kacey

Draw More Furries is now available in bookstores, as well as through my online shop!

Dream Big, Zaenok

Based on Zefanya N Putri's winning entry in my Arctic Animal Comic Competition, this illustration depicts her collared lemming character, Zaenok. I was really taken with the idea of a tiny lemming reaching for the stars and dreaming big. And traveling the ocean by seal. Zefanya will be receiving the original drawing and print of this in the mail as part of her prize pack. :)

Animal Crossing

Paw prints converge into crisscrossing paths.  An illuminated panel from The Last of the Polar Bears pg 26. See the full page here.

Uncertainty

Nanook glances back at the den one more time before joining his sister. A scene from The Last of the Polar Bears. Read the comic here.

Weird Paw Prints

Nanook discovers strange paw prints in the snow.

An illuminated panel from The Last of the Polar Bears pg 25. See the full page here.

Polar Bear at Play

Stella discovers the joy of leaving paw-prints in the snow. An illuminated panel from The Last of the Polar Bears pg 24. See the full page here.

Panthera

Illustration created to help promote the efforts of wild cat conservation group, Panthera, published in the November/December 2012 issue of Bare Essentials magazine (see pg 68 for Panthera illustration).